


Sweetest Rewards

by Duchesse



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Awkward Flirting, F/M, Flirting, Fluff, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, M/M, Other, Reader-Insert, Reader-Interactive, Romance, Self-Insert, drinking contest gets kinda hot, gender-neutral, makeout, this is super flirty because julian is a huge nerd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-22
Updated: 2017-08-22
Packaged: 2018-12-18 18:00:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11879844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duchesse/pseuds/Duchesse
Summary: Julian wasn’t one to say no to a drinking competition, especially when you were his opponent.[Julian Devorak | Reader].





	Sweetest Rewards

**Author's Note:**

> -shrugs-
> 
> i love julian, what can i say?
> 
> but i love count lucio more, i feel it in my bones.
> 
> please support your gal and leave feedback!

He kept count.

_One… two… three…_

His ears rang with the boisterous cheers and slurred chanting from the tavern’s other patrons. The snug little booth in the back which he had whisked you away to, usually veiled by shadows with only the dim glow from nearby lanterns, was suddenly ablaze with light and life.

He couldn’t say he disliked it.

“CHUG. CHUG. CHUG!”

The rosy-cheeked bartender elbowed his way through the crowd to slam down the fourth tray filled with shot glasses and steins, struggling to keep himself from teetering to the ground.

“My bet is on Julian!”

“No way! The Magician is gonna put him to shame!”

Julian took a moment to allow the bite of his beverage slide down his throat, clasping a gloved hand over his mouth before continuing to the next stein. His eye never faltered from your gaze.

You smacked you lips and tossed you empty cup into the crowd, propping your elbows on the little table and leaned in towards him. Julian couldn’t fight the smile that split across his mouth, seeing you sway along with the melodic changing from the crowd. He laughed out loud when your chin slipped away from your palm and your face slammed onto the table.

“Careful now, you alright? Want to call it quits?”  
  
he asked innocently enough, teasing you by touching the rim of his stein against the curve of his lips.

“Naaaaaah. C'mon, les'go!” You immediately jolted upright, slamming your hands flat on the table, rattling the tray of drinks. Once you wet your lips a good six times, and a seventh for extra measure, you clumsily crowded thee shot glasses between your fingers and lifted them. “Look! Look! Julie, beat this!”

Julian watched as you tossed back the middle shot with relative ease, however disregarding physics and the other two shots which drenched the front of your garments, and clung to the exposed skin around your chest.

He sprayed his drink back into the stein, managing to fight back most of the wet coughs stinging the back of his throat. His lips remained clenching to the rim of his cup, eye averting to the tray of drinks as heat blossomed across his face.

“Oh, damn. Tha’ didn’t work,” you groaned, lamenting over the fact that even magic wouldn’t be able to remove those stains. You swiped at your chest with a sleeve, perhaps hoping to salvage what you could of your top, yet all Julian could notice were the glistening droplets framing the contours of your chest.

“My, you’ve made an absolute mess of yourself,” Julian said with a cheeky smile, composing himself enough to slide the stein away and stand up from his side of the booth, albeit with some difficulty at first. “Guess it can’t be helped. Let’s get you cleaned up, how does that sound?”

He extended a hand towards you, one that you seemed to be deliberating was a sign of goodwill or some sort of trap, judging from the way you squinted and focused on it. “Come now, you’re really going to hate yourself tomorrow.”

With an exaggerated and, frankly, hideous scoff, you slapped your hand into his and allowed him to hoist you to your feet where he reeled you closer to him. Despite the collective of disappointed groans reverberating through the tavern, Julian pulled you through the crowd with relative ease.

“Oi! You can’t just leave us hanging! We ain’t got a clue who drank more!” came the slurred cry from the old crone with the bent back. “I bet good money on this!”

Julian rolled his eye and looked back over his shoulder. The noise in the tavern instantly subsided, all eyes fixed on him.

“It’s twenty-seven to thirty-two.”

At once, the tavern erupted into chaos with shrieks of disbelief and others jeered triumphantly. Before anyone had the opportunity to ask for him to specify, Julian quickly dragged you to the back of the tavern into a small, neglected storage room lit only by candlelight.

“Mmm, I was totally the thirty-two!” You chirped once he set you down on a dusty table and began scouring the store room for a rag. “I want a reward for wiiii~nnn~ning!”

Julian managed to find a tablecloth hidden beneath a few boxes and faced you, shaking off the remnants of dust before passing it to you.

“Don’t get too excited, sweetheart. You actually only had seventeen,” he said, snorting once he was able to adjust his eyes to the darkness well enough to see your face contorted in disbelief.

“No way! I won! You saw all tha’… tha’…” you hiccuped, flailing your hand absently as you searched for the word. “Ah, all that stuff. The stuff I drank.”

Seeing that you were making no progress on your own, Julian took the cloth from your hand and dabbed at your clavicle. “You’re going to stain more than your clothes at this rate.”

“Don’t change the subject. I won. Give me a reward!” You demanded, gripping his wrists and forcing your weight on them, finally earning his gaze.

Julian sighed and mentally scolded himself when he felt the heat radiate from his ears to his neck, noticing himself training his attention just away from yours and the way it burned into the side of his head.

“You’re going to be disappointed if you wanted something of value,” he let the cotton fabric slip between his lithe fingers as he raised his hands to show his chest, then turned his pockets inside-out. “Look. Not a coin, not a gem, nor even a wad of lint. I’ve got nothing.”

Despite your pouting, he assumed you were content enough with his response and attempted to pick up where he had left off.

“Y'know, sometimes rewards don’t have to… be  _actual_ things,” you began, scooting yourself to the edge of the table and closer to him. “They can be, like,  _physical_ things or things with symbolism, or even nice words.”

“Nice words, you say?” Julian chuckled, partially draping the cloth over your head. “You did great. You were a good sport back there, losing as terribly as you did.”

“You know that’s not what I meant!” You ripped the cloth away and wadded it up, tossing over his shoulder. “You’re kinda dense, even for unlicensed doctor.”

“Excus–mmph!” Julian’s eye widened with the newfound sensation on his lips. You held the sides of his face, drawing him closer into the kiss until you managed to cuff your arms around his neck.

Julian grasped the edges of the table hard, listening to his gloves crunch from the force. Just as quickly as you had kissed him, you ended it, slowly backing out it and leaving a trail of warmth behind. He hadn’t realized he leaned forward, following the puffs of hot air that still made his lips tingle.

“Pretty good reward, I guess,” you shrugged, trailing a hand along the base of his head, combing your fingers through his hair until they were lost in his locks.

“I’m glad,” Julian responded, huskily. “Now I want mine.” Those words had lost you but a moment as he pressed his fingers to your nape and pulled you close, meshing his lips with yours.


End file.
